Subscriptions are contracts through which a subscriber can receive a material benefit over the course of time. For instance, a subscriber might sign up for a subscription through which they are to receive the benefit of physical items like magazines or newspapers. A subscriber might similarly subscribe to receive the benefit of digital items, like digital audio or video files. Other types of physical and digital items, services, and other types of benefits might also be provided to subscribers through different types of subscriptions.
For a fee, or even no fee in certain types of subscriptions, the subscriber is provided access to the material benefit over the course of time. For example, a customer might subscribe to receive access to a library of digital audio or video files. The contract term for the subscription might be for one month or for a longer period of time, such as one year. The customer might also be billed according to a billing period that is different from the contract period. For example, the contract term of a subscription might be one year, while the billing period is monthly. A subscription will typically stay in effect until the end of the contract period, so long as the customer pays the agreed-upon fee at the end of each billing period. In some cases, a subscription might be automatically renewed at the end of the contract period. Other types of subscriptions and subscription periods might also be utilized.
Managing subscriptions, such as those described above, can be very difficult. In particular, it may be difficult for a merchant to keep track of the various contract and billing periods for large numbers of subscribers, to ensure that the subscribers are billed on time and for the proper amounts, and to ensure that subscriptions expire or are automatically renewed appropriately. Subscription management might be especially difficult for large merchants that have very large numbers of customers, and that offer subscriptions for many types of products or services, each of which might have its own contract, billing, renewal, and potentially other subscription terms.
It is with respect to these and other considerations that the disclosure made herein is presented.